Porta Leoni Archeological Site Historical Timeline

You do not see a gate here. You see about half of one, cut vertically and embedded in the side of a much later building — which turns out to be far more informative than a complete gate would be, because the cut face exposes how the thing was built.

Chronology

1. mid-1st century B.C. Built at the same time as the Roman city wall — and as Porta Borsari, its opposite number — almost entirely in brick. It stood on the cardo, the town’s main north–south street.
2. 1st half of the 1st century A.D. Wrapped in new stone facades during the same monumentalization that refaced Porta Borsari. Both phases are visible in the surviving fragment: the later skin over the earlier core.
3. late Middle Ages The gate has already suffered several mutilations by this point. A later building was raised against it and used it as a free wall; the rest was cut away. That is the normal fate of Roman masonry in Italian cities, and the reason this fragment survives at all — it was structurally useful.
4. 1965 Restoration work uncovers an inscription above the central pilaster.

Why the cut is worth seeing

Because the remainder was removed rather than demolished, the exposed section shows the internal construction: how deep the facing stone runs, what sits behind it, how the arch was turned. A complete gate shows you none of that.

The sunken excavation beside the road reveals the original ground surface several metres down — which is how much Verona has risen since the gate was new.